


The mirage

by breathedout



Category: GLOW (TV 2017)
Genre: (emotional and also financial), Arthie apologizes a lot, Career Satisfaction, Established Relationship, F/F, Fingering, Funny how when you keep doing the same thing you just apologized for, Hotel Living, Ignis ex machina, Impermanence, Insecurity, Jealousy, Las Vegas: the Diner Years, Multiple Orgasms, Relationship Negotiation, Spanking, Tribadism, Vibrators, endings and beginnings, you have to apologize again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-09-17 15:35:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16977288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/breathedout/pseuds/breathedout
Summary: "What are you talking about?" said Melrose. "They've been living togetherherefor like two years.""Well," Ruth said, "Yeah," as Arthie shifted in her seat. "But it's not the same, is it? We all share here; it's one of the perks of Riviera life. Like Whoppers with cheese, and an in-house laundromat."





	The mirage

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scintilla10](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scintilla10/gifts).



> Hey, scintilla10! Thanks for requesting this pairing; I really enjoyed writing them & I hope you'll enjoy the result.
> 
> Thanks, as always, to my lovely and tireless [greywash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/greywash): in all the best ways, you make the Yuletide gay.

And like every time; like it'd always been between the two of them and even now, even now: the _second_ that heavy jolt hit her back; the moment the impact had her staggering, then falling face-forward onto the mattress, warm legs wrapping around her hips, breasts plastered to her bare back, _skin_ , she was wet before she could bounce. And then on the bed, writhing: arms around her neck, thighs pinning her calf, held face-down like she'd been at rehearsal but not like this. Not with the girl above her nuzzling into the back of her neck, into her skin into her shower-wet hair, hips pressing down against Arthie's ass and one forearm leaving her neck to _roll_ weight against the top of her sore back, fuck, perfect, _Thursdays_ , Arthie thought, _God_. 

"Surprise," said Yoyo. Arthie could hear the shape of her smile. 

"You jerk," Arthie panted. But she flexed her shoulder as Yoyo rolled weight into her elbow to dig into Arthie's back right— _there_ , oh—" _fuck_ me, not—not a surprise if you get Melrose to give me a preview." 

"No?" 

"No, I—God—"

"Got you to think about it, though," said Yoyo, which was fucking true, she had thought about it, was thinking about it, was—had been panting for it all morning and fuck it, things were so—it'd felt _good_ to be so distracted all she could think about was—god—so when Yoyo broke the hold like Melrose'd broken the hold to release Arthie's ankle and slide her knee _up_ high up, between Arthie's legs so that Arthie—

—"Ohmygodplease," couldn't stop herself—

—and then Yoyo leaned further forward than Melrose'd done to press her thigh against Arthie's perineum and her knee against her cunt for Arthie to _grind_ rolling her hips, couldn't help it, she loved it like this loved it Yoyo knew she went crazy for it, she _knew_ her so—

"Yeah," Yoyo said. Without moving off Arthie she _undulated_ again: her whole weight a taut wave traveling from her toes to her shoulders: calves-thighs-hips-belly-ribs-shoulders and her face against Arthie's neck, all of her rolling skin and her muscle and the sweat smell of her _against_ : "Come on," Yoyo said, "get your hand under you." 

"Can't—believe you, god." Exasperated; ecstatic; like Yoyo had been making her in this room on this bed for—fuck. She wriggled a hand beneath her, panting. Rutted against the soft meat at the base of her own thumb, and back against Yoyo's thigh that moved against—apart—against—as Yoyo leaned over her own forearm still pressing into the sore muscles of Arthie's back to lick; nip; scrape teeth at her nape. 

"Were you?" Yoyo said. 

"Huh?" said Arthie. It came out a squeak. Yoyo did it again, again that full-body roll and her thigh— _tight_ against Arthie's cunt, god she needed. Pushed her hips back and up against Yoyo so her back arched and she lifted off her hand but she could feel herself full against the hard muscle in Yoyo's dancer's thigh. _Sliding_. Jesus she was wet. 

"Yeah, you're—fuck. That's nice," Yoyo said. A sharp little _smack_ to Arthie's upraised ass; she gasped, and Yoyo groaned. Laughed, and did it again. Sharp bright little—smacks and then that full-body— _roll_ —glacial; controlled; feet legs _hips_ chest _hips_ legs feet reversing it mid-wave because Arthie loved it and Yoyo knew she loved it, had done ever since she'd asked her, years ago, _years_ , god, her legs crossed hard and her whole face flushing hot before she'd brought herself to whisper _Do you think—?_ into Yoyo's ear and Yoyo had laughed and squeezed her waist and said _A sexual request from Arthie Premkumar? Color me intrigued_ , in the cab back to the Riviera from the Shark Club where Arthie had stood in the whooping crowd parted around her new lover on the floor undulating, snake-like, a fluid wave traveling up and—freezing—back down her body, rippling toes to waist, waist to knees, knees to neck until Arthie'd thought if she watched that for another second she'd—combust, or—swallow her own tongue or—shoulders chest belly hips _thigh, smack!_ —

"OhJesus," Arthie groaned, "Yoyo, please, please, god," and Yoyo planted a hand on her ass and pushed her hips back down onto her hand so she had pressure from the back and below and Arthie ground down _hard_ clenching moaning thighs clamped around Yoyo's knee already fucking coming when Yoyo, breathless, told her, "Give me one and then you can have the vibe." 

"Oh," Arthie panted, "my god," again, still buzzing.

Yoyo laughed at her and kissed Arthie's shoulderblade and reached over her head and then there was a louder buzzing to add to what Arthie's skin was doing. Arthie groaned. Floppy; flushed. Sticky skin shower- and sweat-damp, closed all around with Yoyo. She tried to turn over—kiss her properly, kiss her, put her mouth—but Yoyo still held her face-down, her gorgeous weight digging into Arthie's back. 

"Nh-nh," Yoyo said. "Not yet." But she did bend down. Arthie twisted her neck and Yoyo lowered her face so they could kiss—taste. So Arthie could put her mouth messy on her salty cheek—narrow mouth—just exactly the shape of the smile she had seen in her mind's eye when Yoyo, laughing, had said, _Surprise_ , god she loved her. She always loved Yoyo, but smiling, breathless, a little bossy, alone in the afternoon light, stretched on fresh sheets under the rattly AC in shitty old Room 226, sore after rehearsal on Thursday afternoons—

"Come on," Yoyo said. "Get back up here." She leaned back; pulled Arthie's hips up and Arthie, a little rubbery, let her; managed to hold herself up so that Yoyo could slide the Hitachi under her. Right against her clit it was too much but flat to the bed, handle wedged against the bottom of her ribcage, she could press her hips down into the head of it in trembly little pushes: press-pull. Press-pull. Yoyo gave her ass another little smack and her whole skin shivered out into sparky ripples of sensation and she cried out. 

"Were you, though?" Yoyo said. 

"Was I—what." She circled her hips so her clit brushed—back, _brushed_ —

"Thinking about this," said Yoyo. 

"You know I—ohgod. God." Yoyo's thigh pressing forward and Arthie's push-pull: _press_ , push-pull, _press_ push, pull _pressing_ , syncopated with Arthie's whipping—little—circles—

"When Melrose modified that hold like I said. And told you it was from me."

"You _know_ I was, y'were," Arthie said. Circles. So much. _Press_ , circles, so _much_ , teasing, pressing, couldn't, _press_. "Watching, I. I saw—"

"Yeah," said Yoyo, with feeling, pressing her knee forward, _circles_. "I sure was." 

" _Oh_ ," Arthie said, closing her eyes, brim-full and dripping over with the thought of Yoyo's eyes on her in the ring, "oh, _oh_ ," and toppled, sucked under by—waves, circles and pressing waves, Yoyo slapped her ass again and the crest _broke_ so with her whole body drawn taut Arthie shook and—shook oh and—and Yoyo pressed her weight forward— _shook_ and—front pressed to Arthie's back and—and Arthie thought. Gulping breath, _fuck_ , oh, again, god _god_ , oh, _god_. Cross-eyed. Panting. With Yoyo leaning forward like that, Arthie thought, breathless, that now Yoyo would touch her hair. She would; she would have; she was always tangling her fingers in Arthie's hair, it pulled when she did it when it was wet but right now. Still heaving air Arthie braced for it, not caring in the least but Yoyo didn't. She just put her hand down on the pillow next to Arthie's head and pressed her whole body against Arthie's body and the vibe shifted under her and _back_ so the rumbling and the echoes of rumbling shifted in her and _built_ and oh, oh, oh, oh, messy wrecked almost painful it rippled out _again_ ; "Yeah, that's it," Yoyo said, "that's it," soothing voice over the whimpering animal noises Arthie was making, coming again. 

"Oh," she said, "fuck." And then: "Let me, unh. Too much. Uncle."

Yoyo hummed, and drew back so that Arthie, still gasping, could slide the Hitachi to the side, turn it off and flip over onto her back. Yoyo, naked, kneeling over her, looked so pleased with herself. Really she was. Unfairly gorgeous. God.

"Wow," Arthie said. 

Yoyo chuckled. Arthie grabbed her wrist; kissed the inside of it. Kiss; nuzzle. Yoyo liked a little biting; when Arthie did it now she made a pleased, interested little noise. She walked forward on her knees, straddling Arthie's thigh with a hand to either side of Arthie's head: lowering herself down so they could kiss—mmm. Kiss. Arthie's hands came up to Yoyo's waist; her ass. Her curls, sweat-damp. The complex curves of shoulder; breast; side: silhouetted by the relentless August sun diffused by the filthy second-floor window: an effect which Arthie thought, a little hysterically, made Yoyo look like an angel.

"I was thinking about it," Arthie told her, between kisses. "Wanting it. Gold star for you." 

Yoyo made a noise halfway between a laugh and a purr. "Mmm," she said. Kiss. "'S good. I like it when you want things."

Arthie rolled them; nipped at her neck and her shoulder; nuzzled her face against the side of her breast. The mini-fridge droned and whined, and outside a military jet screamed its way through the hellish cloudless heat. Yoyo ran her hands down Arthie's shoulders; touched her face; they rolled again and Arthie pulled her close. Sucked on her bottom lip as she smiled; Yoyo kissed her back. Tangled her legs up with Arthie's legs and kissed her and kissed her. Arthie's thumb brushed her nipple and Yoyo shivered; her skin pebbled up and Arthie's breath caught. It was still thrilling, still, and something a little—darker. That Yoyo reacted like that to something Arthie did. It still thrilled her and it still made her a little—hungry; a little greedy; however much of it she got. Yoyo liked Arthie's hands and when she was kissing like this she liked a scrape of nails so Arthie gave it to her: down her back, along her outer thighs. The Hitachi had rolled to rest against Yoyo's calf; Arthie's fingers closed around it. 

"You want a _Workout_?" she said. When Yoyo snorted and pulled back to look at her, Arthie, serious-faced, waggled her eyebrows and held up the vibe, her Vanna White hand gesture made awkward by the way she was pinned. Yoyo's face cracked into a grin, half-surprised; she shook her head, and Arthie felt again that swooping, covetous pride, that Yoyo looked so pleased because of her. It seeped into odd cracks of the past, that pride. Made her proud of things that were mortifying, in actuality. She'd been shocked by the vibrator, when Yoyo'd first shown it to her. Incredulous at the outdated coloring and "TheWorkout" printed down the side. She'd been awkward. Stupid; she'd been a prude, it was embarrassing to remember, to draw attention to; cracking herself open right over her soft underbelly, she hated it, still, most of the time. But god: that smile on Yoyo's face. Like she was delighted. Like she wanted to stay. 

"You dork," Yoyo said, and kissed her again. Humming. Arthie moved to turn on the vibe; snuck it onto Yoyo's side so that she yelped and twisted, swatting it away, laughing: "Stop, oh my god" and Arthie made a cartoon villain face; held it up and cackled while Yoyo laughed. "Turn it off," Yoyo said, laughing, "oh my god"; so Arthie switched it off and twisted over to wedge it under a pillow so it wouldn't keep rolling against them. Yoyo kissed her reaching shoulder. Her belly. "Mmm," she said, and then twisted back to meet her: her lips on Yoyo's lips, her arms around Yoyo's neck. Into her mouth Yoyo said: "I just want your hands." 

"Yeah," Arthie said. "Course." She sucked on Yoyo's bottom lip and then let her go and Yoyo sat back and up, still straddling one of Arthie's legs. Arthie knew what it meant but she still said, "Like this?" reaching palm-up to slide first two fingers around the edges of Yoyo's labia, as Yoyo nodded. Wet; parting-circling; avoiding her clit until she did it herself; Yoyo biting her bottom lip above her as Arthie felt her way. That little twist of her wrist—"Yeah," Yoyo murmured, eyes half-closed, half inward-turned. Arthie, slipping inside, wanted more of that. Dripping handfuls. More than Yoyo thought she had to give. 

In small arches Arthie moved her hand: slipping in-out cupped against the curve of Yoyo's pubic bone. In a moment Yoyo would—yes, sink down; when she did Arthie gave her little— _tugs_ —"Fuck," Yoyo said, "yeah" rising up again, her strong thighs; Arthie's fingers curling-tugging against her g-spot whenever she sank down. Tug; curl; Arthie's other hand on her opposite hip and the whole beautiful length of her, Jesus. Arthie'd just come until she'd almost cried but she could go again. Yoyo touched her own neck. Her breast. Arthie wanted to, to run her tongue—

"What do you call this?" Yoyo said. Her voice so sex-rough that it took Arthie a moment to process. 

"I—your collarbone?" Yoyo's fingers traced along it: neck to shoulder. Sweat collected there, Arthie thought. Her mouth watered. 

"I mean, god," Yoyo said. Grinding lazily on Arthie's fingers. "The technical name."

"Uh. Your clavicle?" 

"Mmm," Yoyo said. Her hips made a dirty little twist; instantly Arthie needed her to do it again. Just that, she thought, watching Yoyo's hips. Just that, just like that, and she tugged—twisted—"This?" Yoyo said. 

Arthie unglued her eyes. Breathing hard.

"Your, uh. Glenohumeral joint?" she said. Yoyo gave another of those whipping little hip motions, god she was _good_ , she was so _hot_ ; fervently Arthie wanted her to sit on her face. Move her hips like that, like that, get Arthie's face so wet she'd have to wash her hair again, get her _drenched_ —

"This?" Yoyo said again, and Arthie, finally, blinking—

"What are you doing?" she said. 

Her hand, limp, came to rest knuckles-down on her thigh. 

Above her, Yoyo stilled. Arthie looked at her. Feeling—exposed. Badly fitted together. The AC dripped cold on her chest and her face.

"Why are you like… quizzing me on anatomy?" she said. Yoyo shrugged.

"I dunno," she said, though she plainly _did_ know: this whole elaborate afternoon surprise was obviously, now that Arthie thought about it, set up with the intentional goal of getting them—here. Wherever this was. 

"Are you—into that?" Arthie said. She could feel herself blushing, which was so just. _Unnecessary_ , after three years and, and coming five times just this afternoon; why was she like this. It didn't seem worth it now, like it'd seemed five minutes ago. "I mean. You've never said you were into that. I mean—it's okay if you are, it's just." She looked up at her. Squinted. "Are you?" 

Yoyo shrugged again. _That's a no_ , Arthie thought, as Yoyo said, "Thought it might make it more fun."

"Might make—"

"You know." She leered. "Hands-on study group. Playing doctor."

 _Playing doctor_. The gears in Arthie's brain felt like they were mushy; missing teeth. 

"You know," Yoyo said. "For when you go back to school."

Arthie felt it happen: her whole body locking up, click-click-click-click-click. Yoyo must have felt it too because she sighed, and rolled off Arthie, and then off the bed.

"I'm—not," Arthie said. She didn't _want_ her voice to be so frigid, so careful; but out it came. The teeth were back, all of them: just not on the gears where they belonged, but filling up her guts and her mouth. "You know I don't want to go back to school." 

The teal robe Arthie had bought Yoyo for her birthday the year before was draped on the TV stand, but Yoyo walked past it into the bathroom; a second later came the sound of the shower. Arthie very intentionally unclenched her jaw.

"You know I was only in med school in the first place because of my dad's whole— _thing_ about me taking over his practice from him," she said. "You—where is this coming from, you know I never liked it."

"It's just," said Yoyo, over the sound of the shower, "You're so smart, you've got a good start on a degree. You shouldn't throw it away just to spite your dad."

"It's not _spite_ ," Arthie said, and she hated that, she _hated_ that her voice always _did_ that, but she couldn't make it stop. "It's choosing not to do something with my life that I don't enjoy doing, for reasons that don't matter to me." 

"So don't do that," Yoyo said. "Do something different, something you like. Change your major, or whatever."

"Why are you obsessed with this all of a sudden?" 

"I just thought," Yoyo said, "now that I'll have a more regular paycheck, and with _GLOW_ probably ending, you could—"

"You know," Arthie said, "speaking of your new paycheck, you seem to be doing all right, thanks very much, with no degree, stripping your way up the food chain of the Vegas floor show circuit, so I'm not sure why when it comes to me it's all, Oh, Arthie—"

"Forget it."

"—go back to school and make something, whatever, _respectable_ of yourself, the job that we've done, you know, _together_ for the past three years, isn't good enough for—"

"You hate this job!" Yoyo shouted. "Oh my god!"

"—you, it's only good enough for literally all your friends and your—girlfriend, or whatever…" 

She faltered. Bit the inside of her mouth, arms crossed on her chest. 

"Forget it, Arthie," Yoyo said again, shutting off the shower, and she sounded so tired and discouraged that Arthie wanted to take it all back, everything; to agree to whatever, a future in her dad's stupid podiatry clinic, looking at Mrs. Hernandez's bunions, if it meant this whole conversation could not have to happen. Forget it: right.

She didn't forget it, but she tried to let it go. She sat up in bed, listening to Yoyo's hair dryer and her nighttime makeup routine, staring at Yoyo's robe on the dusty TV stand in the stupid shitty hotel room that was the only thing the two of them had ever had, together, instead of a home. When Yoyo got out of the shower, fresh and clean in her jeans and tank top and ready to go out with the rest of the girls, Arthie said she was sorry for snapping, she was sorry, she didn't mean it; and Yoyo sighed, but she nodded. 

"I'm just tired," Arthie said, and Yoyo didn't call her on it. She gave her the out: asked if she wanted to just stay in, have an early night. 

"Yeah," Arthie said, "thanks," and thought she should feel relieved, but she didn't. Half an hour before, everything had felt almost solid again. Like it used to be, or—like it used to seem like it could become. Now—

Now, Arthie smiled at her, and Yoyo kissed her head where her hair parted, and turned, and left the room.

***

"Two Croissan'Wiches," Jenny said, sliding them in front of Rhonda and Ruth, "a Cheeseburger Bundle, that was you, Carmen; Stacey you got—"

"French Chicken—"

"French Chicken Sandwich," said Jenny, passing it over, "and Dawn, you got the Italian. Uh—Chicken Tenders for Reggie and Yoyo; Suicide Burger for Sheila, I had to ask for that shit special by the way, Sheila, the girl didn't know what the fuck I was talking about at first, she had to ask her manager; Arthie you had a Long Fish Sandwich—"

"Long Fish here too," said Melrose, waving her arms, and Jenny frowned, pawing through the tray, as Arthie unwrapped her sandwich. 

"I don't have another—oh," she said, "yep, here you go, Long Fish for you. Fish Tenders for Tammé. And American Chickens for me and Cherry. Whew." She slid the black plastic tray to the middle of the table, and plopped down on the moulded plastic seat between Reggie and Cherry. "Pay up and eat up, girls. For maybe one of the last times."

"Oh," said Rhonda, looking mournful, as Arthie studiously unwrapped her sandwich. "Don't say that."

"No use getting precious about it," Cherry said. "Looks like it's gonna happen."

"Yeah but they're—the new management is just moving the show off-site, right?" said Ruth. "We could just—move with it." 

"Will the new filming site have such fine dining opportunities, though?" Arthie said, swallowing whatever was rising in her chest. It was worth it: Yoyo, next to her, snickered, and cut her eyes sideways so their gazes met over the top of a Chicken Tender dunked in ketchup and that. Arthie smiled; she didn't even have to try. That was what she loved: that warm, glowing feeling of sharing something. A joke, a meal. A tradition, you could say, a feeling you could count on: these Sunday afternoon lunches, every week for three years at the Riviera's in-house Burger King, where food was cheap and didn't require leaving the air-conditioned sanctuary of the hotel to brave the wall of desert heat outside. Yoyo nabbed a fry from Arthie's basket. 

"Matt called me in for a meeting," said Carmen, shaking her head. "He was real cagey about his actual plans, but reading between the lines: I think they're planning to cut almost all of us. Hire new actresses, change the type of humor. Get a group that would be, what did he say. Easier to mould."

"That fucking snake," said Melrose. 

"Well if he doesn't like the humor then I'm on the block for sure," Ruth said. 

"And us," said Stacey. Dawn nodded, glumly, and so did Tammé.

"He must be interested in keeping you, though," said Rhonda, leaning into Carmen's shoulder. "If he called you in specially."

"So he claims. Off-screen, 'on a consulting basis,' which he said like he was giving me some big present. 'Course he also told me not to say anything about it to any of you. So looks like that deal would be off even if I wanted it."

A chorus of whoops went up around the table. "Yeah Carmen!" Cherry said, toasting with her sandwich, and Rhonda, beaming, kissed Carmen's cheek, and squeezed her into a tight hug. Carmen looked pleased, but disgusted too: shaking her head. 

"Well," said Tammé. "We've got the last three fights of this season."

"That's three more Sunday feasts," Reggie agreed. "And then—Carmen, what are you gonnna do, if you're not taking Matt up on his offer?" 

"Working on a project with my brothers," Carmen said. "Kind of like a touring variety show, with some of their friends. There's a mother-in-law apartment in back of their place, where we can stay while we're—" she blushed, realizing, as the _Oooooh_ went up from the crowd. 

"You and—you and Rhonda are—you're moving in together?" said Ruth, a half-step behind everyone else, but twice as delighted. 

"What are you talking about?" said Melrose. "They've been living together _here_ for like two years." 

"Well," Ruth said, "Yeah," as Arthie shifted in her seat. "But it's not the same, is it? We all share here; it's one of the perks of Riviera life. Like Whoppers with cheese, and an in-house laundromat."

"Discounted 'Viva Las Vegas' sweatshirts from the gift shop," said Stacey, who, conveniently, was wearing hers.

"Yeah and 'Viva Las Vegas' shot glasses," Cherry said.

"'Viva Las Vegas' coffee mugs," said Jenny.

"Discounted drinks at the bar," said Arthie, and Melrose said, sounding scandalized, "Girl, how are you paying _anything_ for drinks at the bar, after all this time?"

"George starts mixing Melrose's special when he sees her walk in," Dawn said, and everyone laughed. 

"He gets his money's worth," said Melrose, winking at no one in particular, for another ripple of laughter. 

"Early-morning swimming is nice," said Reggie. "Before the little kids take over the pool." 

"And hiking to the under-construction tower for a change of scenery," said Jenny. "God, when was the last time I even left this building?"

A chorus of agreement went up around the table. "Well," said Yoyo, "August in Vegas. When you live in the _actual_ armpit of Hell—" 

"You leave the Riviera, though," said Rhonda. 

"Tcsh. To get a cab to the—" 

"That's right!" Carmen said. "Yoyo! Your new job!" 

"Oh," Yoyo said, looking uncomfortable. "Well."

"It's in that huge new hotel where the Castaways used to be, right?" said Cherry. "That place looks insane, I hope they know what they're doing."

"Way to be supportive," Ruth said, smacking Cherry on the arm, but Cherry shrugged. 

"I just call 'em like I see 'em," she said. "What tourists are they gonna fill that thing with? Even this dump is half-empty all the time, and they are gonna have to charge _way_ more to stay in that joint, to make back the cash they have sunk into it. The kind of money they want in there goes to Atlantic City now."

"You're dancing, right, Yoyo?" said Ruth, turning her back on Cherry. "What's the show? Is it big? What's your part?"

"You know," said Yoyo, "it's not even for sure yet." Her voice was—strange. Quelling. Arthie glanced over, but Yoyo wasn't looking at her; she was looking at Ruth, then looking down at her meal, shrugging. "And Cherry's right, who knows if they'll even keep my part, or—whatever. How long it'll last. If the place will even open, or what."

" _Yeah_ ," Melrose said, "but c'mon, it's still super exciting that you—"

"What are _you_ doing if we're all let go?" Yoyo said. 

She was looking right at Melrose, and there was a long, tense moment when Melrose looked back. It held, and held, and then it snapped; and Melrose said, " _Actually_ ," sitting forward, breaking her staring contest with Yoyo, "my friend Shelley? From Malibu? She has a lead on this play down in Long Beach, _wild_ shit okay, and she said there's this part—"

And Arthie, numb in her moulded plastic seat, could feel Yoyo next to her, slumping in relief or disappointment or whatever it was, for just a moment before she straightened up again, and put her arm around Arthie's sinking shoulders.

***

The thing was, Yoyo _did_ leave the Riviera more than most of the girls. She definitely got out more than Arthie, who often realized, when she tried to think back, that between sleeping, filming, working out, drinking and eating in-house, she couldn't actually remember for sure the last time she'd gone outside. The first time that'd happened she'd kind of freaked out—they'd _used_ to go out, they'd all used to go out _together_ —but now it was fine. Mostly. Not ideal, probably, but what were you going to do. Vegas in August—or July; or May—a hundred and twenty degrees, dust covering everything and no shade anywhere; a bunch of them had just gotten tired of dealing with it. Yoyo said she got restless inside, but Arthie thought if she hadn't had her second job, stripping at the Crazy Horse, she wouldn't leave the Riviera much either. And it was kind of nice for Arthie, honestly, to have the room to herself a few nights a week.

It was just—times like this. Yoyo got out more, so she heard about things. When you asked Yoyo what she wanted to do, there was always a list. Now Arthie stood staring at a Rolls Royce convertible encrusted in crystals, feeling— _she_ ought to have a list, too. Shouldn't she? She couldn't even put her finger, precisely, on _why_ she should: Yoyo didn't seem to mind. Did Arthie herself? She only felt, vaguely, that she was lying when she called her parents on the phone from Room 226, and said _We want to get tickets to Michelle Shocked at the Troubadour_ , or _We want to get out to Red Rocks when the weather cools down_ : and it wasn't the _want_ so much; it was the _we_. Not that Michelle Shocked and Red Rocks weren't cool; all Yoyo's suggestions were cool. It was just, on days like today, when she'd been trying to—to make things better, herself. She should've been able to do more than asking Yoyo, _Is there anywhere you've been wanting to go?_ and then trailing along after her. She should've had something of her own to offer. Though admittedly, whatever it was would have a hard time competing with that car. 

"That's quite some car," Arthie said, as Yoyo came back from the ladies' room.

"Mister Showmanship," Yoyo said, and nipped at Arthie's ear. "Luz says he used to drive it onstage at the Hilton." 

"For real?" She tilted her head, trying to picture it. The car had white fairy-tale horses all along the side: lacy frolicking curlicues, interrupting the background of sparkling crystal. A little plaque by the driver's side fender held a photo of the costume that had gone with it: a silver sparkly tux under a white mink coat with a four-foot train. 

"Mmm," said Yoyo, pointing. "His little go-go boy backup dancer in matching white livery, and everything."

"Liberace had go-go boy backup dancers? For what, the Moonlight Sonata?"

"I mean, not in his _public_ shows," Yoyo said, with a little quirk of her mouth; and Arthie was surprised into a snort-laugh and then felt—god. 

"Hey," she said. Cleared her throat. "With the girls the other day, at Burger King."

Yoyo turned, surprised, the grin falling off her face. "Yeah?"

"I didn't want—I mean." She took a breath. "It's really exciting, your new job. It really is. I know you're excited about it and I—I _want_ you to be excited about it, I don't want you to have to change the subject and pretend like you're not, just because I'm there and I'm—I'll feel bad, or. Whatever." 

She made her eyes move from the air above Yoyo's right shoulder—which was easy—to her eyes, which weren't, and which had that quiet, deep-considering look they got. Arthie smiled at her, a little watery. 

"I don't want to feel bad," Arthie said. "Because it's awesome. And you should be proud."

Yoyo put her arm around Arthie's shoulders. Kissed the side of her head. Arthie leaned into her: a little shaky.

"And I _know_ you brought me here so you can steal wardrobe ideas for your act, so we may as well go over to the costume section," she said. Yoyo squeezed her, hard, and then turned them both to walk over to the opposite wall, where hung a coordinating cape and jumpsuit in an ombré fade from scarlet to silver, shot through with gold thread and worn with a scarlet silk shirt. 

"Like, you'd look amazing in that jumpsuit, for example," Arthie said. 

"Yeah?"

"Totally."

"Hm. It _would_ look pretty good with my hair."

"I'd leave off the shirt, though. Boob—"

"Boob window," Yoyo said, nodding sagely. "Yeah. Smart."

Arthie giggled, and Yoyo let her mock-serious face slip a little way toward a grin. Arthie wanted—she reached up. Tucked a curl behind Yoyo's ear. Yoyo cleared her throat, looking down at Arthie, and then looked back up at the costume. 

"I probably won't have too much input on costumes," she said. "Not right away. And on _GLOW_ that was always more Jenny, anyway. Though John did say that me filling in for other girls' routines on _GLOW_ and at the Crazy Horse, meant I had a good shot at Dance Captain in the next year or so." 

Arthie thought: _was_ , but she said: "Dance Captain, that's great, I—what does that mean, exactly?"

"It's like, keeping track of all the different dance roles in the show, knowing all the different choreography. Making sure there are alternates who can go on if someone's sick or hurt."

"That's totally you!" Arthie said. She'd hopped a little to show excitement. She'd kind of decided to do it, but it seemed okay. Was it? Yoyo was smiling in this horrible tentative way and she felt—she didn't know where to put her hands, or her feet. 

"Yeah," Yoyo said. "Marsha's choreography is sort of, like, I don't know. Conservative, I guess. You know, sanitized for the tourists. And with those huge ensemble pieces most individual dancers don't get to do much that's interesting. Kind of a come-down after being the center of attention whenever I'm onstage. But I think the more organize-y part of the job sounds interesting. I think I'd be good at it."

"You _would_ be good at it," Arthie said. She didn't have to pretend to mean that one. "You'll kick their asses into shape; they're lucky to get you." 

Yoyo didn't answer, but she bumped her shoulder against Arthie's shoulder, and when Arthie glanced over at her, as they walked on, she caught a glimpse of a dimple. 

"It's another fifty bucks a week, too," said Yoyo. She was looking up at the wall now, even though there wasn't much to look at; it was a space between costume displays. "And I get paid for the whole package. Rehearsals and everything, not just the time I'm actually onstage. And it's, like, um. It could be a long-term thing, you know? If the hotel takes off the way they hope it will, I could, I mean. I mean, I get _sick_ leave. In a couple years I could have a down payment on a house. Like a real house."

They'd meandered down the wall, and come to a stop in front of a three-piece suit in flamingo pink, dripping with silver beading. The coordinating cape had embroidered feathers, and a scalloped ruff that stood straight up from the wearer's shoulders. Arthie stared up at it, _down payment_ echoing around in her head, heart clunking against her ribcage, thinking she could—ignore them, or drown them out or something, by telling Yoyo she'd look great in this one, too. It would be true, she thought, blankly. Yoyo looked great in everything. 

"A house," she said, swallowing. "Like… here? In Vegas?"

"It'd be hard to keep dancing on the Strip if I lived in New York."

"Yeah," Arthie said. "No. Obviously." 

Yoyo stopped; turned to face her; Arthie didn't meet her eyes. "You don't want to keep living in Vegas?" Yoyo said, which was _so_ just—beside the _point_ , how to even—

"I want to— _I_ ," spluttered Arthie. " _I_ am not the one with her bags packed and her down payment all planned out and her—I'm not the one referring to _GLOW_ in the past tense, like it's all over, when we still don't even know if we're getting canceled or fired or just moved to a different filming location, or what, I'm— _I_ didn't want anything to change, so I don't know—"

"I don't—"

"—what my input's really worth in this situation, since I live in the same hotel room you've been sharing with me for the past three years, seemingly willingly—"

"Arthie, what the fuck?" 

"—and I _don't_ have a savings account, or another job after this one, or a car since I left my old one in LA, or even like a friend in this city who I don't work with, so—"

"Neither do I!" said Yoyo. "I just have two jobs, so I work with more people than you!"

They were yelling. Arthie knew they were yelling, which was embarrassing, and her eyes were stinging and they were getting stared at by the like four other people walking around the Liberace Museum at 2pm on a Wednesday, but that's what it was, she didn't care, it didn't matter. None of them worked on the show, so, as she'd just admitted, there was zero chance they knew her anyway. 

"I don't know what you're saying," she told Yoyo, miserably. 

"I'm asking you to move into a house with me, you asshole," said Yoyo. It surprised Arthie enough that she laughed a little, which made her whole face crumple up, and a second later she started crying for real. Yoyo saw, but she didn't come closer; didn't touch her. She said, "Which I would have thought would be less of a hard sell, seeing as, like Melrose said, we've already spent three years living together in a _single hotel room_."

"I _like_ our hotel room," Arthie said. Here in the museum the bright, glitzy capes and the chandeliers and the jeweled harpsichord or spinet or whatever it was over there in the corner and the rococo writing desk with the heavy gilt inlay all bore down on her raw little human skin. She hunched her shoulders. "It's fun."

Yoyo looked at her, incredulous. "You've been complaining about it since like, day two. _Ugh, Yoyo, I can see every part of the room from every other part of the room_. Or: _What's your hottest fantasy, Yoyo? Mine's having a real stovetop and oven, and a full-sized fridge with an ice-maker_. Or: _If we bribed Marta not to tell, do you think Management would notice if we knocked out the wall between our room and 228? Then it'd be like living in TWO broom closets_. I mean! It's constant. You _literally_ never stop." 

It was like she'd been—punched. Caged in; trapped. As those were all direct quotes, the larger point was hard to argue with, but—but that wasn't how it had been. Had it? She'd thought—she'd been trying to be funny, when she'd said those things. And Yoyo had laughed; she had. Those dimples. She didn't _get_ those dimples when she was only pretending to laugh, Arthie _knew_ she didn't. But of course it wasn't like Arthie had taken photographic evidence in order to confront Yoyo with proof of her own happiness when Yoyo threw Arthie's words back in her face, in public, in front of a display of flamboyant silk dinner jackets. It had been like—like a bit they'd developed. Arthie bitched about the hotel room and Yoyo bitched right back at her and it was all part of the fabric of their little life together. Like fooling around after rehearsal on Thursdays. Like Burger King with the girls. 

"This will be different, though," Arthie said, very small, in her stupid soggy voice.

"Yes!" Yoyo said, throwing up her hands. "It'll be _better_!" 

Arthie just stood there. The tears weren't too bad, not terrible. But it was like the bottom had gone out of her.

"I don't have any money for a down payment," she said, and Yoyo said, "Jesus Christ," and turned her back, and stormed back out through the door, and onto Tropicana Avenue.

***

Yoyo actually took off, after the museum. She got her own cab; left Arthie to find her own way. The worst part was that Arthie couldn't even be mad at her about it because she'd told Yoyo, on multiple occasions, that when they fought Yoyo should do exactly that: give Arthie some space; leave her to cool down. Yoyo, slamming the yellow car-door and riding off alone, was objectively being a great girlfriend, in the same way that Yoyo inviting Arthie to move in with her was being a great girlfriend, in the same way that Yoyo making a goofy sex game out of encouraging Arthie to go back to school was being a great girlfriend. She was just. _Fantastic_ , wasn't she, supportive, beautiful, perfect Yoyo the perfect girl.

Arthie, standing on the gum-encrusted sidewalk in the 120-degree heat in front of the Rum Runner Lounge, kicked the metal support of the bus stop, and hurt her foot.

She should move. _Walk it off_ was what she'd always told herself in LA, muttering it like a mantra—or, as her mother said, like a crazy person—speed-walking down Sepulveda, flipping off the cars that honked at her, shaking off whatever fight she'd had with her dad or her grandmother or Dr. Peter "Condescending Douchebag" Miller, O-Chem professor and star of the nightmares of every female pre-med student at ACLU—or, later, with Sam Silva. Also a condescending douchebag, what do you know. 

Arthie kicked the bus stop again. The sole of her sneaker left melted rubber on the metal. 

All right, she thought. Okay. 

She may have been more accustomed to the eighties or nineties, and even more so to the air-conditioned Riviera, but it wasn't like Arthie was a stranger to dealing with godawful heat. The bus pulled up and she got on it and then she got off at the Fashion Show Mall, where she did her whole speed-walking and crazy-person muttering deal in the hall of climate-controlled concrete: an angry circuit from Saks to Dillard's to Neiman Marcus and back around past the old Goldwater's that was in the process of being converted to a May Company. Arthie glared at it as she passed. Once. Twice. Four times. She ate a spiteful rice bowl at the Panda Express, then did another eight laps, shoving her feet in front of her until the closed-down Goldwater's made her feel more tired than angry. 

By the time she got back to the Riviera it was dark, and her legs ached. Between the crying and the sweating, her makeup had run down her face. Her shoulders hurt, and her eyes hurt, and she knew she'd been a total jerk for like a week, which was stupid, and exhausting. When she unlocked the door to Room 226, Yoyo was lying on the bed, on her back, paging through a copy of _Glamour_. Arthie closed the door, and leaned back against it. 

"I'm sorry I've been a jerk," she said. "It's stupid, and exhausting."

"Yup," said Yoyo. She popped the p, and turned the page. 

Arthie sighed. She went and sat on the edge of the bed, and they just existed there in silence for a while, breathing the same air: Arthie staring vaguely in the direction of the tiny sink and the mini-fridge, feeling the dull tired ache in her legs, and Yoyo turning her magazine pages in a regular but gradually-slowing rhythm. Eventually, the page-turning stopped completely; Arthie could feel, she thought, the weight of Yoyo's gaze on the side of her face. 

"Go for a hike with me?" she said; and Yoyo, sounding more tired than mad, said, "Yeah. Okay."

So Arthie stood up and Yoyo slid on flats—"my hiking boots," she'd used to joke, back before they'd both bought real hiking boots that they'd so far actually used a grand total of once—and Arthie held up her room key, because Yoyo always double-checked with her otherwise that she hadn't forgotten it, and they walked down the old familiar second-floor garden-side hallway, not touching, Arthie looking down at her sneakers on the blue-and-purple Jenga-looking carpeting. It _was_ hideous, she could admit. She'd said so often enough, and it wasn't like she'd been wrong. 

To get into the under-construction tower, you had to enter either from the ground floor of the north wing of the hotel—"the wrong wing," as the _GLOW_ girls called it—or duck under a bunch of plastic tarps and keep-out tape to go over the skybridge from the fourth floor of the south, or "correct," wing. Arthie shuffled ahead, and held the clear plastic and the yellow tape up for Yoyo to duck under; Yoyo rolled her eyes, but she went. Arthie walked a little behind her along the bridge, and then on the other side, Yoyo held up the layers of plastic for her. 

The construction crew was starting to sheetrock the bottom storeys, but the top ones were still open-air. If you went up high enough, and it was late enough, there was usually even a breeze with a hint of coolness. Yoyo and Arthie climbed up the metal skeleton of the tower's emergency stairs: five floors; ten; fifteen; until, panting, they paused, feeling the air stir. Between alternate studs, extending out into the night, there were little slabs that would become balconies: Yoyo cocked her head, and Arthie nodded, and they eased their way out onto one, feet dangling over the edge. Then they sat there, side by side, and looked at the lights of Las Vegas Boulevard. 

Arthie thought, looking down, about all the times they'd done this before. The tipsy explorations with Jenny and Melrose, right after the hotel had broken ground on the addition: passing a vodka bottle around, debating between another evening at the Riviera bar or heading to a club on Fremont. The time Yoyo had blindfolded Arthie, and took her up in the construction hoist, before the tower stairs were even built; then pulled the blindfold off and presented her with the view. The times Arthie had come here with one of the other girls: with Rhonda, that month when she was freaking out about Carmen; with Sheila, that time her mom showed up out of the blue and couldn't stop crying, and she wouldn't say why and wouldn't go away and couldn't afford a room of her own and neither could Sheila, and there was nothing else she could do. Arthie remembered wishing she had something to offer Sheila; anything. But it wasn't like Arthie could afford another room, either. It wasn't like she could invite Sheila over for dinner, like a regular person; or drive her anywhere, even, without a car; or distract her or take her out for a meal somewhere her mom was unlikely to be, in this nowhere city in the nowhere desert, on the like $30 in her bank account. She remembered, suddenly, how trapped she'd felt—by Vegas, and the Riviera, and above all by _GLOW_ itself, which kept her here. 

"I guess I did hate it," she said. "At least—part of the time, I did."

Yoyo made a noncommittal noise. Arthie took a big breath; then let it out, slowly, swinging her legs. 

"It was ours, though," she said. "I just didn't—when you said that, in the museum."

"Jesus Christ."

"There were _parts_ of it that were good, parts that—I don't—"

"Arthie, of _course_ there were—"

"Well! I don't _want_ none of it to count. I don't want it all to have been fake, or temporary, or like—like a joke, or a mirage, or—"

"It _wasn't_!" said Yoyo; and Arthie said, "Okay!" 

The breeze took the sharpness of their raised voices; smoothed it away. Arthie felt like a stewpot, a potion-pot, bubbling up with prickly knotted weeds that would lodge in her throat: not to be swallowed, and not to be spoken. Down on the Strip the lights of the cars inched along. 

"And," Yoyo added, in a softer tone, "I see what you did there."

Arthie didn't answer; didn't know how. A few seconds later Yoyo nudged into her: shoulder to shoulder. "Mirage? Hm?" she said, and Arthie leaned into her, just a little. She felt she hadn't earned that lean, not really; but she wasn't too proud to take it when it was offered. Her eyes closed, of their own volition. She ought to bring up the whole mess again, try to sort it out, but she couldn't, she was too tired of fighting, and she was just too tired. Yoyo, where they touched, was warm. Sticky. Even though the night was warm too and the day had been hellish, Arthie didn't straighten up. 

"How did you decide on Melrose," she said, a time later. "For the—you know. Thing at rehearsal. The other day." She was blushing, but it was dark; and anyway it was no news to Yoyo that she was a disaster. "I had three matches, how did you choose that one."

Yoyo was quiet for a minute. "Asked Jenny first," she said at last. "She said, direct quote, _Leave me out of your and Arthie's weird sex games_."

Laughter broke from Arthie. Ungainly, too-loud; swept away by the breeze. 

"That didn't bother Mel, though?" 

"Nope," said Yoyo. "She was up for it."

"Noted," Arthie said, almost under her breath, but Yoyo heard her and made a sound half-mocking, half-intrigued. 

"Why Miss Premkumar," she said, and she was smiling, though her tone was still a little flat; a little sad. "Have I finally managed to open your eyes to the allure of the casual threesome? What other debaucheries are lurking under your adorably prim and somewhat awkward exterior?"

Arthie didn't quite giggle, but she smiled; and they leaned into one another, quiet.

"It was really nice of you," Arthie said. "That whole day."

"Mmm," Yoyo said. "I'm a nice girl."

"Oh you are not," Arthie said. "You're a—" 

"Arthie," Yoyo said, and she grabbed her arm, so that Arthie thought for a second she was mad about the teasing, but: "is that," said Yoyo, pointing.

"What?" Arthie said, twisting around, getting up on her knees to crane around where Yoyo was pointing, thinking she'd recognized someone on the ground though it was dark, really dark except for a faint kind of flickering light coming from below them; it seemed to move with a kind of unpredictable motion and Arthie: "Oh my god," catching a whiff of smoke, said: "It's on fire."

Later, when she tried to explain what the next few hours were like, Arthie would come up with phrases like "a click in my head" or "things got quiet." But it wasn't so much either of those as that all the other things—everything that had been hounding her for the past week, everything that _wasn't_ a solid, narrow focus on what was happening _right in front of her_ , and what it meant about what needed to happen in the next five minutes—got flattened down in her mind. Her fights with Yoyo, the whole thing with the house and the job and the end of _GLOW_ , the loss of Room 226 and the wild, unmanageable way she felt about not knowing what would come after—all of that was still there, all the time. But it was like it—receded. It was like all those things, in a mass, drew back; flattened themselves onto the bottom of her brain like a sole on the ocean-bed, so that the immediate crisis could be lifted up, and seen in all its detail. She'd had emergency training, of course; she'd had lectures on smoke damage; and all of that was in there somewhere, but it wasn't what she was thinking about as she and Yoyo rushed down the hall, evacuating the rooms that gave onto the burning tower. She was only thinking, clear and plain, as if reviewing a list in front of her face: this is what needs to be done. 

In the end of the corridor toward the tower, the smoke was already thick enough that the first few people whose doors they knocked on coughed when they opened. Arthie had Yoyo stand with her the first time she said: _It's a fire, don't stop for your stuff, go out the north side and alert the management, go now_ ; then she sent Yoyo across the hall to give the speech herself, and she did. Another thing Arthie would say, later, is that it was almost like she was floating above it all; but just like the click and the quiet, that was never quite true, either. It was only that she could see—could see the moving parts. What needed to be done. She could see it, and she could see that others couldn't see it; but when Arthie told them what to do, they did it. Even Yoyo had been practically hyperventilating after they'd first seen the flames; but when Arthie took her shoulders, told her to breathe with her, in-two-three-four, out-two-three-four, now we're going to have to get down, and we're going to have to get the people out of the nearest wing, okay—well, after that Yoyo never wavered. Even when there were screams around them, children wailing, people crying, her voice when she asked Arthie questions—"Fire department?" "I sent the woman from 129"—was rock-solid. 

By the time they'd evacuated the first floor, Riviera employees were arriving to help out. Arthie knew what had been done and what still needed to be done, so she dispatched them to where they were could help. At the time she didn't stop to ask herself how they were all finding her; how they knew she was the person to ask. In the moment it seemed logical, natural; she was the one with the key knowledge, so of course it was she who should organize them. She sent people to close all the heavy doors between the building wings, to try to act as a fire-break; she organized squads of evacuees from one side of the hotel to alert the other side of the hotel about the danger. A group of the first evacuees had come back and were putting together a bucket brigade bringing water from the kitchen; that brigade were the ones who directed the fire department straight to Arthie when they arrived twenty minutes later. By that time the tower was creaking through the roaring of the flames. A crash and then another from the interior as Arthie caught up the fire captain on what had been done, and what hadn't. It wasn't until he took over, thanking her, that she looked up, and up, and her clarity of focus wavered for the slimmest moment: she and Yoyo had been standing there. _Right_ up there: and as she thought it, the whole side of the structure buckled, and collapsed, crashing to the concrete below.

***

Arthie and Yoyo didn't sleep that night. After the fire department took over they helped evacuate the remaining people from the hotel, and then everyone congregated in the hotel portico, where they could watch the firefighters point their hoses into the half-collapsed tower. The rest of the _GLOW_ girls found Arthie and Yoyo; and Carmen said the woman from next door to her and Rhonda was on an oxygen machine and having trouble standing up this long, so Ruth and Cherry got on the phone to the hotels around them on the Strip, alternately sweet-talking and threatening them into offering up their vacant rooms for free since it was already three o'clock in the morning; and Arthie recruited Melrose and her limo to get the elderly and infirm moved to more comfortable digs. By the time they were all taken care of, it was daylight, and what had been the half-completed tower was more or less a blackened concrete patch on the ground; and it was still smoking, but it wasn't on fire anymore. Arthie leaned against one of the portico pillars, watching the commotion, thinking with a weird clarity about the night, and the week, and the past few years.

The night concierge, Lamia, who must have been almost off duty when the fire alarm went yet who was still very much at work, came out around six to speak to the guests gathered under the portico: she asked everyone's patience while the fire department inspected the rest of the hotel, but said preliminary reports were that the blaze was out. A tired cheer went up. Lamia smiled at Arthie, and Arthie smiled back, and Lamia told the group that while they waited, there was complimentary coffee and a continental breakfast being set up on folding tables by the door, and to help themselves. The milling and murmuring was immediate; Lamia ducked back inside. 

"Goddamn," Cherry said, looking across at the tower. 

Nobody answered her; they were all looking, too. 

"Well," said Melrose. She yawned, and scratched her neck, and then squeezed Arthie's shoulder and meandered over to the coffee table, tugging her bathrobe around her waist, the rest of the girls close behind. Arthie put a hand on Yoyo's elbow, to stop her following. 

"Hey," she said. 

"Hey yourself," Yoyo said. She ran a thumb along Arthie's jawline; up behind her ear. "Hero of the hour."

"You mean it, about this being real?" Arthie said.

"Really?" Yoyo said. "Again? Right now?"

"Just—do you."

" _Yes_ ," said Yoyo. 

"And the good stuff, you know, it's actually been good even though the bad stuff has also been bad?"

"I keep saying."

"And you don't mean, like—it was real because it was _really_ shitty, or—you _really_ hated every moment of it, or—"

"Oh my god, Arthie," said Yoyo. "What better way do I have of convincing you I like living with you, than to ask you to move in with me again?"

"No," Arthie said. "I mean, I know."

"Like, what do you want to happen? _GLOW_ ends, you want to just keep living in the Riviera? For what? The rest of our lives?"

"No, listen," said Arthie. "I—of _course_ it's not feasible to just keep living out of a hotel forever."

"No!" Yoyo said. "It's not. And for that matter—" 

Arthie took a deep breath. Gave herself just a moment, touching Yoyo's warm wrist as Yoyo yelled at her, and her heart kicked up like it hadn't, really, during the fire. She looked out at all the people standing around the vestibule, blankets over their shoulders, clutching muffins and styrofoam coffee cups and blinking into the early morning. They were there because she'd organized it—well. Partially. Still, though. All these people. They were tangibly better off because of her. That was something, wasn't it.

By her side, Yoyo was saying, "—for _another_ thing, before you start to wind yourself up about having no savings account to compete with my vast wealth that I'm about to use to purchase a mansion where I'll keep you as my concubine, lording it over you and—" 

"Yoyo," Arthie said.

"—only letting you out in order to force you back to med school to follow your father into podiatry or whatever it is you're freaking out about: I _wouldn't do that anyway_ and also I don't have any money yet either! This thing at the new hotel might totally fall through. And even if it doesn't, and even if I get the promotion, I'm not gonna be a fucking investment banker all of a sudden, for Christ's sake, I'm talking about saving up over _years_. You _have time_ to figure it out, Arthie, I swear to—"

"I was thinking—EMT training," Arthie said, and Yoyo looked utterly taken aback for maybe three-quarters of a second before she burst out laughing. 

"Of course you were," she said. "Of course. Right." She pulled Arthie to her; kissed her forehead, kind of unnecessarily hard. Arthie spluttered. 

"I think I'd be good," Arthie said, into Yoyo's shoulder. "I was good at this. Tonight."

'I should've read you the riot act a week ago." 

"And it would use my pre-med," said Arthie, "but it's like a two-year program instead of four plus a residency, maybe even quicker since I already have some background."

"Though I guess I would've had to set the hotel on fire, too," Yoyo mused. 

"And it would be dealing with urgent situations," Arthie went on. "Like tonight. Not like Dad's, which always bored me to tears even working the front office when I was a kid."

"You were just casually thinking about all this while saving our lives, apparently."

"Shut up," said Arthie. She was blushing, for a change; she could feel. "What do you think?"

"I mean, it's no forcible sex-slave confinement in my fabulous mansion," Yoyo said, considering, as Arthie punched her on the arm. "But it'll do."

**Author's Note:**

> I suspect that the show is about to gloss over this (based on Ray's claims that "Vegas is where the money is" and "There's nothing bigger than a live show in Vegas"), but Vegas in the 80s was kind of a dump. With the watershed November 1989 opening of The Mirage—the first project of Steve Wynn, modern-day ultradeveloper and the so-called father of modern Vegas—it would start on the trajectory of family-friendly yet go-big-or-go-home luxe glitziness that characterizes it today. But in 1986-1988, when GLOW historically filmed out of the Riviera Hotel & Casino, the vibe in Vegas was that of a washed-up, un-stylish, down-at-heel diner town that had once been a high-rolling destination but had since fallen on hard times.
> 
> Hit hard by the combination the fuel crisis/recession in the late 70s, and the legalization of gambling in Atlantic City, lots of casinos were going under. The Riviera, for example, had already declared bankruptcy in 1983, and the CEO who was appointed to turn the place around, which he tried to do by marketing it toward the middle class instead of the high rollers. The Burger King in the Riviera was the first BK franchise inside a Vegas casino; many followed. In the case of the Riviera, these attempts were marginally successful, but not successful enough that they avoided filing for bankruptcy again in 1991.
> 
> I took a couple of liberties with the chronology of events here. The fire in the under-construction tower at the Riviera actually happened in August 1988, not 1989. (The renovation was completed, although the tower was never rebuilt.) I moved it up a year so that it would better correspond with Yoyo landing a dancing job at the about-to-open Mirage. And the change to off-site filming of the show, which involved the hiring of a new set of actresses, took place after two years, in 1988, not three, in 1989.
> 
> The Liberace Museum that Yoyo and Arthie visit no longer exists at its old location on Tropicana, but its collection is apparently on display at Thriller Villa, Michael Jackson's former home. If I ever have the misfortune to find myself back in Vegas, I hope to visit.


End file.
